One of the major decisions when setting up your online business is who to accept payment from your customers. The better and more customisable your method is, the more is going to cost but the more professional it will look. In this article I will go through the various options available.

Paypal

Using something like Paypal or Nochex is cheap and very easy to set up. All you have to do is create an account with them and use their generator to generate a HTML button for you to insert into your page. When visitors click the button they are taken to the PayPal site to make the payment.

This means however that they must have a PayPal account. But once they have registered a PayPal account they will be able to order later without having to fill in all their details again.

Nochex

Nochex is a British version of PayPal however you can only make payments via a Debit card such as Solo or Switch so if your not selling to a European market this wont be very useful to you.

However if you use it in conjunction with Paypal, it is good because people have the options of the two and any people who pay via Nochex will be a plus because the fees for Nochex are usually cheaper.

Commerce sites

The alternative to these is to use an online payment system such as World Pay (http://www.worldpay.com) or Click Bank (http://www.clickbank.com). These sites usually cost more and have a set up fee but will look more professional and be more business orientated.

Merchant Accounts

If you want to be able to process credit card payments yourself and be able to take orders via you secure server without needing anyone else you will need a merchant account. These are likely to be costly but they offer you full customisation and you don't need any other websites or companies involved as everything goes through you, directly to your bank.

Conclusion

The bigger your business and the more professional you want it to look, the more money you have to invest. If you starting up your home business I recommend you start with someone simple such as PayPal and work your way up.